LETTER: Jammed up by company cars

Sir: I find the newfangled concern expressed by all our political parties to find a transport policy not overly biased towards the motorcar more than slightly hypocritical. Indeed, I will not begin to take them seriously until they adopt a firm policy of removing tax relief entirely from company cars - and from the parking spaces enjoyed by senior executives in so many office blocks. Such a policy would not only discourage the use of cars for commuting (the prime cause of traffic jams in our major cities); it would also provide the Treasury with more than pounds 1bn in additional revenue. Unfortunately, the present government's mania for privatisation means that the money could not be applied to helping our ramshackle urban railway systems, because it would simply end up in the pockets of private shareholders.